ABSTRACT
“Do you know how 80 year-old people fuck?” After sex, when the 60 year-old Inga is lying naked in bed, entangled together with her 76 year-old lover Karl, he suddenly asks her: “ Do you know how 80 year-old people fuck?” “How?” Inga replies and Karl says “ She’s standing on her head and he dips it from above.” They both laugh. This scene, from the German film Cloud Nine (2008) about a romantic and sexual relationship in later life, evokes the popular image of sexuality in old age as defined by impotence. But the scene, through jokes and laughter, also challenges the pervasive idea that older men’s impotence is the end to sex in later life. The couple have just had intercourse and Karl is only four years away from 80 and a possible expiry date for his erectile function. But instead of mourning and dreading a future of impotence, Karl and Inga laugh about it and merrily present playful alternatives when penetrative sex becomes difficult or even impossible.
